Return of the War Party?

Is a vote for Mitt Romney or Newt Gingrich a vote for
yet another unfunded war of choice, this time with a nation, Iran,
three times as large and populous as Iraq?

Mitt says that if elected he will move carriers into
the Persian Gulf and “prepare for war.” Newt is even more hawkish.
America should continue “taking out” Iran’s nuclear scientists — i.e.,
assassinating them — but military action will probably be needed.

Newt is talking up uber-hawk John Bolton for secretary of state.

Rick Santorum has already called for U.S.-Israeli
strikes: “Either we’re going to stop them … or take the long-term
consequences of having a nuclear Iran trying to wipe out the state of
Israel.”

But if Iran represents, as Bibi Netanyahu is forever
reminding us, an “existential threat,” why does not Israel itself,
with hundreds of nuclear weapons, deal with it?

Bibi’s inaction speaks louder than Bibi’s words.

He wants the Americans to do it.

For the retired head of Mossad, Meir Dagan, calls
attacking Iran “the stupidest thing I have ever heard of.” He means
stupid for Israel.

Why? Because an Israeli attack would be costly in
planes and pilots and only set back Iran’s nuclear program. And such a
preemptive strike would unify Iranians behind the regime.

Moreover, Israel would be inviting Tehran’s ally
Hezbollah to rain down rockets on Israel, igniting another of the bloody
Lebanon wars that Israel was desperate to end the last time.

As for the United States, the only way we could
eliminate Iran’s nuclear program would be days of air and missile
strikes.

Iran could retaliate by cutting off oil exports and
mining the Strait of Hormuz, tripling the world price of oil, and
hurling the European Union and United States into recession.

Iran could also turn Hezbollah loose on Americans in
Lebanon and urge Shias to attack U.S. troops, diplomats, and civilians in
Bahrain, Iraq, and Afghanistan, and here in the United States.

No one knows how this would end. A U.S.-Iran war
could force us to march to Tehran to remove the Islamic regime and scour
that huge country to ensure that it was shorn of weapons of mass
destruction — for an Islamic regime that survived a U.S. war would be
hellbent on acquiring the bomb to pay us back. Yet we lack a large
enough army to occupy Iran.

And why should thousands more Americans have to die
or come home to be fitted for metal limbs so Israel can remain sole
proprietor of a nuclear weapon from Morocco to Afghanistan?

And where is the hard evidence Iran is acquiring nukes?

The U.S. intelligence community declared in December
2007, with “high confidence,” that Iran was no longer seeking nuclear
weapons. It has never rescinded that declaration.

And there is no conclusive evidence in that
media-hyped report last week from the International Atomic Energy Agency
that Iran is for certain building nuclear weapons. Indeed, that report
was exposed as the work of incompetents within hours.

Relying on intelligence agencies, the IAEA said a top
Russian nuclear weapons scientist had been instructing Iranians for
years. The scientist turns out to be V.I. Danilenko, who has no
expertise in nuclear weapons, but is a specialist in using conventional
explosives to produce nanodiamonds for the manufacture of lubricants and
rubber.

Are we being lied and stampeded into yet another war
by the same propagandists who gave us the yellowcake-from-Niger
forgeries?

Bibi calls Mahmoud Ahmadinejad another Hitler and says we are all in 1939 again. But is this credible?

True, Ahmadinejad hosted a Holocaust conference
featuring David Duke and said Israel should be wiped off the map, but he
does not control Iran’s military, has lost favor with the
ayatollah, and has been threatened with impeachment. Ahmadinejad is a
lame duck with less than two years left in his term. Is mighty Israel
afraid of this man?

Told that the IAEA said Iran was actively pursuing
nuclear weapons, Ahmadinejad laughed: “The Iranian nation is wise. It
won’t build two bombs against 20,000 [nuclear] bombs you [Americans]
have.”

Does he not have a point? How would an Iranian bomb
secure Iran, when Israel’s nuclear arsenal would be put on a hair
trigger, and Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt would then rush to get their
own bombs?

In that South Carolina debate, Ron Paul, the one
person there proven right on Iraq, was given less than 90 seconds to
speak.

Under the Constitution, said Paul, no president has
the right to launch an unprovoked attack on Iran without congressional
authorization.

Before America goes to war with Iran, let Congress,
whose members are forever expressing their love for the Constitution,
follow it, and vote on war with Iran. And before we go to the polls in
2012, let’s find out if the GOP is becoming again the same old War Party
that bankrupted the nation.